Anniversaries

Anniversaries

TODAY: Births: Kenneth Grahame, author, 1859; Frederic William Goudy, printer and typographer, 1865. Deaths: Louis-Hector Berlioz, composer, 1869; Sir Thomas Beecham Bt, conductor, 1961; Richard Austen Butler, Baron Butler of Saffron Walden, statesman, 1982. On this day: a coal strike began in Britain, 1944; the United States landed 3,500 marines in South Vietnam, 1965; the Nelson Column in Dublin was destroyed by an IRA bomb, 1966. Today is the Feast Day of St Duthac, St Felix of Dunwich, St Humphrey or Hunfrid, St John of God, St Julian of Toledo, Saints Philemon and Apollonius, St Pontius of Carthage, St Senan of Scattery, St Stephen of Obazine and St Veremund. TOMORROW: Births: Amerigo Vespucci, explorer, 1454; Ernest Bevin, statesman, 1881; Victoria Mary Sackville-West, novelist, 1892; Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin, astronaut, 1934. Deaths: David Rizzio, secretary to Mary, Queen of Scots, murdered 1566; Arnold Toynbee, social philosopher, 1883; George Burns (Nathan Birnbaum), comedian, writer and producer, 1996. On this day: Napoleon Buonaparte married Josephine de Beauharnais, 1796; the Soviet Union sent the first dog, Laika, into space, in Sputnik 9, 1961. Tomorrow is Mothering Sunday and the Feast Day of St Bosa, St Catharine of Bologna, St Dominic Savio, St Frances of Rome, St Gregory of Nyssa and St Pacianus.